Pointing my domain to Shopify DNS or IPThis post is outdated

I own my own domain, but I want it to do what Shopify example sites do like http://www.sugar-baking.com It appears they have their domain pointing to a shopify DNS or IP address. Each click of a link displays in the browser's address bar.

The instructions tell you to use a "cname" which I do not want to do. I don't want people going to shop.mydomain.com. I want them to go to mydomain.com just like the shopify examples show me you can do.

I also do not want a stealth redirect (iframed) or a standard pointing, which simply flips you back to storename.myshopify.com

Can someone please tell me if some stores are allowed to point to an IP address, or if there is a better way? I use POWWEB.com if that helps (which is not mentioned in the wiki instructions, but changing cnames is usually the same everywhere).

I can't share my domain name because this forum is crawled by Googled search and I am days from registering my LLC and don't want that out there just yet.

A CNAME record can be anything including "www" which is what you want for your CNAME record.

From the wiki:

Shopify gives you a free xxx.myshopify.com style domain for your store. For most customers this is enough but some customers want their own www.myshop.com style address for obvious reasons.

So follow those same instructions. Add a new CNAME record for www.your-domain.tdl that points to you myshopify addy. Then do a 301 redirect of the root domain name (usually connotated by the "@" symbol in most domain managers) to the CNAME of www that you just created. Then you just need to claim your domain name under DNS and Domains in the admin of your store. Most of the registrar instructions are fairly close to each other.

Caroline, thanks for that, but just saying it doesn't direct me. It's like me telling "you just take a flimflam and schmow it up the buyah." What I need are directions. Where do I access the root domain? what file of field edits the 301 redirect? The wiki is great using specific directions for specific services, but not for mine. Thanks for any specific guidance.

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Jamie, If I follow your instructions, this is what I'd do if only I knew where the 301 field is:

>for Alias, I would enter "WWW"

>for Host, I would enter "yourshopname.myshopify.com" where "yourshopname" is my shopname.

>for 301, I would enter "domain name forwarding" (which doesn't make sense to enter. It's not a command)

>"forward all traffic from mystorename.com to www.mystorename.com" sounds easy, if only it instructed how.

That's pretty sad, this is a standard feature for most registrars. You may want to call them. Both of their methods will break your CC processing. Cannot run in a frame.

From their page:

URL - your domain points to a URL outside your hosting account. Choose either a standard or a stealth redirect.

Standard Redirect - creates an HTML file that redirects traffic to the address you specify. Your visitors will see a blank page for a moment while being redirected to the target URL.

Stealth Redirect - creates an invisible frame set with the target URL in the main frame. Visitors will see the original URL in their browser window and the page of the target URL in the middle. Users will navigate within the frame set and the original URL should not change.

This might be worth noting in instructions before customers like me get this far down the road :) I'll report back if I find a fix.

There are a lot of messed up domain registration places out in the wild, so it is hard to account for all of them and their ""you just take a flimflam and schmow it up the buyah"" ways. I end up getting clients to switch registrars about 50% of the time before I start doing anything. You have got have the tools to work with.

Heh, that was funny, huh? ;) OK, I found out I CAN do a 301 redirect using my .htaccess. I'm doing that now and will know in a day or two if it works. POWWEB says it should. I'll post instructions here once I see it works for future searches. Thanks very much for your patience and instruction. it helped tremendously to get me to ask the right question of my registrar ;)

1) go to CUSTOM DNS within your control panel2) choose your domain from the drop down in the upper right corner of the resulting page3) scroll down to the CNAME area and click "add more"4) for the ALIAS field enter "www" without the quotes.5) for the HOST NAME field enter "yourshopifystore.myshopify.com" without quotes and where "yourshopifystore" is the name of your store6) save and then go to your FILE MANAGER link from the main control panel.7) create a folder for your domain within "HTDOCS"8) inside that folder place a txt file and rename it ".htaccess" without the quotes9) add this code:

10) Got to DOMAIN POINTING MANAGER within DOMAIN CENTRAL11) for your domain you want to direct to shopify, select SUBDIRECTORY within POINTER TYPE. Under POINTS TO, add "htdocs/directory" where "directory is the folder you created in step 7.11) Now, claim your domain within your shopify admin under PREFERENCES > DNS and DOMAINS.

I have followed these steps to try and get this to work with my powweb hosting and shopify shop, but to no luck. Possible because Powweb has changed their control panel? and there is no longer the option for "alias".

And every attempt to update the DNS within Shopify results in a "failed".